


Aurora Borealis

by cutmylisp



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Gen, Genderfluid Pidge | Katie Holt, Hunk & Lance & Pidge | Katie Holt Friendship, Hunk & Pidge | Katie Holt Friendship, Keith & Pidge | Katie Holt Friendship, Keith & Shiro (Voltron) Friendship, Lance & Pidge | Katie Holt Friendship, Pidge | Katie Holt-centric, Voltron au, pidge gunderson - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-07
Updated: 2020-05-07
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:21:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24048868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutmylisp/pseuds/cutmylisp
Summary: Pidge has a medical condition that no doctor has ever been able to properly diagnose. She sees colours in everyday life around living objects and objects people have interacted with. She suffers from major migraines in the time after she sees these colours. At the Garrison University, she has been searching for answers, but her research has been uncovering too little for her liking. One night at a party, she meets Keith, who may be able to point her in the right direction.
Relationships: Keith & Pidge | Katie Holt
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10





	1. House Party

**Author's Note:**

> All major characters are over the age of 18.  
> There are no actual voltron things involved. I am just using the characters.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pidge shows up to a house party. Lance answers the door and invites her inside. Hunk is in the kitchen baking some sweets. Pidge has her first vision troubles of the night.

Some atmospheres can’t be described. The waves of feelings sent out are catastrophically different from the simple feelings most humans can detect. The room immediately becomes uncomfortable when the atmosphere turns into something unreadable. I don’t aim for awkward silences, but somehow, I constantly find myself in those situations. I try to avoid any places that may result in me getting wound up in one of those situations. That’s why I’ve been standing outside this door for five minutes.

I’ve been saying the same words over and over in my head; _“Just ring the bell.”_

My fists are balled up and my breaths are harsh. It shouldn’t be this difficult to make my presence known. The windows are alight with changing colours and I shake my head in frustration, shutting my eyes tightly. I don’t even know whose party this is. I could be showing up without anyone I know already being there. I sigh heavily. If I do it now, it’ll be over with. If none of my friends are inside, I’ll have a reason to go home. I breathe deeply and raise one of my fists and extending my pointer-finger. As I do, the door opens.

“Pidge!” A cheerful voice says. I look up and admire his bright smile. He has a drink in one hand, the door in the other and is wearing black jeans and a red shirt with the word ‘rad’ written on it in big, bold letters.

“Hey, Lance,” I reply, grinning at his attire, relieved that my friend is already here.

Lance opens the door a little wider and gestures for me to come in. I peek into the hall and see crowds of people in bright outfits, streamers hanging loosely from the roof and lots of spilled drinks. This is the perfect place for something strange to happen.

Lance looks back at me, his face falling from an ecstatic smile to a sympathetic one. “Hey,” he starts, the tone in his voice softer, “It’ll be okay. It’s just a party, alright?”

“Yeah,” I say, burying my hands in my jumper pockets, “Just a party.”

My feet move before I tell them to and I walk into the house. Lance closes the door behind me and comes to my side.

“Let’s go to the kitchen. I’m feeling peckish.” He announces, walking down the hall. I follow at his side. The hall has a cross-section in the middle where two doorways are situated. One of them has light and music pouring out of it, and the other is closed. The lights from the room to the right pump out different colours at a high speed and the song that is playing makes my whole chest vibrate as we pass it. People are laughing and yelling over the loudspeakers. It’s chaos; not necessarily a bad chaos, but chaos, nonetheless.

At the end of the hall is another doorway which leads to a more open space. A living room is straight ahead, an outdoor area slightly to the left and a kitchen more to the left.

“Lance, you’re not here to steal more cake, are you?” A voice says sceptically. I turn towards the voice and see a very familiar, warm face.

“Pfft,” Lance starts, “Hunk, my good man, when have I ever done something like that?”

Hunk narrows his eyes at Lance as he slides a tray into the oven, then he looks away. His eyes catch mine and his mouth stretches into a smile.

“Pidge! Hey!” He greets me, excitedly. I wave at him. Before I can get a word out of me, Hunk looks back at Lance and asks, “How did you coax _her_ into coming?”

“Honestly, man, I have no idea. It must have been my pure awesomeness.” Lance replies, putting his hands on his hips.

Hunk rolls his eyes and laughs. “Yeah, because your ‘awesomeness’ is _definitely_ effective on Pidge.”

Lance leans forward and asks, “Are you doubting my awesome powers?”

“I never said that!” Hunk replies, throwing his hands in the air.

“But you thought it!” Lance shoots back.

I chuckle at the two of them as they continue to argue and look at the place around me. It doesn’t look like anyone is using the outside space even though there are decorations scattered everywhere. I wonder if the crowd might move outside later, or if it stays empty, I could use it as an emergency getaway in case things get too intense. The living room just outside of the kitchen is spacious and has two couches on adjacent walls, one of them facing a TV. The walls are empty but there is a fluffy rug on the floor, a coffee table sitting on top of it. Whoever lives here seems to be more of the comfortable type, rather than an interior designer. I imagine two people cuddled up on one of the couches, one holding a cup of tea, a cup of coffee on the table, an arm each around each other on a cold, winter day. A warmth spreads through my chest and brings a light smile to my cheeks. As I stare and dream longer, splotches of colour begin to appear around the furniture. Pastel pinks, blues and lighter browns overpower the dark shadows of the room. The colours make the room seem safe and homely. Although halfway transparent, the colours grow and bleed together like watercolour. The blending colours are entrancing, and I can’t pull myself away from them until they form a very distinct violet colour around every piece of furniture in my vision. The violet colour becomes darker and less transparent and grows so large that it begins to eat away at my sight. A sharp pain that comes from the back of my head erupts through my brain. The violet pulses once and becomes a lighter colour, like a purple that seeps from blueberries, then it goes back to the dark, dangerous violet. I breathe in sharply, feeling as if the colour is swallowing me, blink, and the colour is gone, the pain is no longer, and the room is shadowed over again.

I blink a few more times, not sure what to make of the situations, then shut my eyes tightly, rip my glasses from my face and turn to my two friends.

“Can one of you please clean these?” I ask blindly. Their bickering stops all at once. After a moment, one of them takes the glasses from my hands.

“Yeah, of course.” Hunk says softly. My hands fall to my sides, my eyes still shut.

“Did it happen again?” asks Lance. I nod silently. I here Lance sigh.

“Aren’t these supposed to stop those colours, or whatever?” Hunk questions, the squeak of fabric rubbing glass entering my ears. “Is there an off switch that you pressed accidentally? Or, maybe they ran out of juice?”

I laugh a little, then explain, “They don’t run on any current – electricity or juice. It’s a special kind of glass that I melded myself. Sometimes it’s not enough to keep them all out, I guess.”

“Hold out your hand,” Hunk says softly. As soon as I do, my glasses are placed in my palm and a large hand closes over my own, locking the glasses in my hand.

“Do you need to go home? I can drive!” Lance offers, sounding worried.

I know that I should go home. That’s what my doctors recommend, anyway. Waves of this kind of thing some for about 12 hours after the first occurrence. The pains get worse and last longer and the colours show themselves more frequently, even with my glasses on. The doctors have put it down to migraines or eyestrain, but I’m sure that it’s something more. Either way, it scares me to death, but I didn’t come all the way out to this random person’s house just to leave in the first minute of being in the door.

“Nah,” I decline casually, placing my glasses back on my face. I open my eyes and crack a grin. “I’ll get back to the drawing board tomorrow.”


	2. Cake Break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pidge stays in the kitchen area with Hunk and Lance until the cake is ready. Throughout this time, Pidge finds out that the party she is attending is for Lance's 'mortal enemy', Keith Kogane. Pidge's vision starts to act up again.

Throughout the night, the music just gets louder. I barely know any of the songs and people in the other room are no good at singing them. Lance has been coming in and out of the party room to fill up his and his new friend’s plastic cups for hours and Hunk has been in the kitchen, checking on his sweets for most of the evening. If not checking the oven or the fridge, he’s been standing just outside the kitchen with me and a few other partygoers, chatting. The conversations are forgettable, as most are at parties. I don’t even remember the names of the people we’re talking to and can barely hear anything over the blaring music from the next room over. I find myself drifting off into my own world throughout other’s sentences, and before I know it, Hunk’s timer has gone off and him, myself and the people we were talking with are seeing up a birthday-looking food arrangement on the kitchen bench.

“What did you say you did again, Pidge?” a girl asks while folding napkins.

I pick up a small tray of a selection of cookies and reply, “I’m a major in robotic technology at Garrison University.”

“Wow!” a guy replies, “That’s such a prestigious school! You must do really well to have been accepted.”

I place the tray on the crowded bench and grin before fixing my glasses. “Ah, all I really do is tinker.”

“Actually,” Hunk begins through a cake offcut, “She’s getting the highest marks in out of everyone taking that major, and she’s made a name for herself as a program designer two years before she’s even due to graduate.”

“Woah!” both people exclaim at the same time.

My hands clasp together, and I fiddle with my fingers. “Really, Hunk, it’s not that big of a deal. I’m just making a living.”

Hunk puts his hands on his hips, his motherly stance matching his apron, and faces me.

“You shut your mouth, smarty-pants. You know you’re a genius.” He declares. I shake my head, smiling and stick my tongue out at him. We all chuckle and continue setting up under Hunk’s command. A soft yellow feeling sits in the air among us. Hunk takes the presentation of the food quite seriously and is determined to have every platter line up with the cake in the centre. Hunk, after some re-arrangement, decides that the food is ready to serve.

As I hand Hunk a bowl of popcorn, I feel a sudden warmth wash over me. It starts at my ears and ends at my toes, fizzling through me like a sparkler on New Year’s Eve. I notice a movement in my peripheral vision and my head snaps in the direction of the movement. The living room is still dark, but next to it is a hallway I didn’t notice before, and in the doorframe of that hallway stands a person. They lean on the doorframe and seem to be looking off somewhere distant. I tilt my head and squint in their direction. I can’t see their face, as a hood casts a shadow over them. I have an urge to find out who this person is, though I have no reason to. Could it be their mysterious nature? No, maybe I’m just getting into the socialisation spirit? I may as well give in, right?

“Hey, you wanna help?” I ask. Their head flicks in my direction and their eyes reflect the kitchen light slightly. The light bounces from their eyes back at me and sends a shock through me. Gold sparks begin to collect at the edges of my vision and I immediately start blinking them away. By the time I get rid of the gold around my eyes, the person is gone. I sigh slowly. I guess they’re not too into the party scene either.

At that moment, Lance walks in with almost more cups than he can carry. One of them slips from his grasp and drops to the floor. He mutters a curse under his breath and dumps the cups on the bench, turning to pick up the lone red cup on the floor.

“Hey!” Hunk yells, “Careful of the cake!”

Without a second glance, Lance replies, “Well sorry, I’m busy attaining hydration juice!”

“Waiting hand and foot on all your new friends, huh?” I snicker.

“Hey!” Lance replies. I chuckle, covering my mouth with my hand.

“Well, we’ve been busy putting together a masterpiece, so maybe you could be so kind as to not destroy it with all your plastic cups.” Hunk rebukes.

Lance stands up straight with the rogue cup in his hand and stares at the food set out on the bench.

“How are we going to eat all this?” he wonders aloud.

“Pure will power.” I reply.

Lance grins at me. “Well, okay then. I’ll call everyone in.” He says, immediately turning back towards the music room and yelling something about cake. A cheer erupts and people spill from the doorway.

I didn’t realise how many people were crammed in that front room. As they fill up the kitchen and living room, I’m pushed to the back of the crowd. I can’t see the bench from behind all the people, so I pick a wall and lean on it, listening to the murmuring around me. I hear a spark of some kind and a few whoops from the other side of the room. I guess the cake-candles are being lit. There is a little movement in the centre of the crowd of people and some soft _sorry_ s being said again and again, and a stressed-looking Lance pops out in front of me.

“Lance!” I beam. His face changes noticeably when he sees me.

“How’d you get back here?” He asks, lowering his eyebrows and smiling.

I shrug. “The people have spoken. They say, ‘No cake for Pidge!’”

Lance chuckles and sinks to the floor next to me. I watch his head drop and his face fall. He fiddles with the plastic cup in his hand. I slide down the wall and sit.

“Hey,” I start. Lance looks at me sideways, then back down at his half-filled cup. A scowl has appeared on his face. “What’s up? Did your friends ditch you already?” I tease.

“No, I just don’t want to see him.” Lance vaguely answers.

I narrow my eyes. “Him? Who’s ‘him’?”

Lance takes a second to breathe, then mutters, “Keith.”

“I’m still not sure who you mean.” I admit. I always seem to have to pry these things out of Lance.

He turns his entire head towards me with a shocked look on his face. “Keith Kogane? That really super talented guy who dropped out of our class not too long ago? The huge douche bag? My mortal enemy??”

I look up and rack my brain for the memory of someone named Keith who matches this description but find nothing. “Nope, not ringing any bells.”

“You’re literally at his birthday party.” Lance responds, his eyebrows now lowered in disbelief.

I shake my head violently at him. “Wait, what? You invited me! Why are we at your ‘mortal enemy’s’ party right now?!”

Lance rolls his eyes. “Relax! C’mon Pidge, a party is a party no matter who it’s for.”

“But you’re avoiding the person the party is being thrown fo-“ a finger is placed to my lips.

“Sorry, I can’t hear you over the tasty drink I’m giving you.” Lance says, shoving his cup at me. Orange liquid spill down the side and onto my jeans. I glare at him. He looks down at my pants and back up at me. “I’m sure it washes out…”

I sigh and grab the cup from him, taking a sip. A tangy, fizzy flavour fills my mouth that I have never tasted before. I almost choke on the drink and some spurts onto Lance’s shirt. He raises his hands, grabs his shirt and looks back at me. “Dude!” he exclaims.

I wipe my mouth with my sleeve and grin at him. “Now we’re even.” I take another sip and watch Lance pull a napkin from his pocket to help dry up the liquid. The fizzy drink races down my throat. The taste of is almost strange enough for me to put drink down, but the warm, fuzzy feeling that fills my chest convinces me to take another sip.

The crowd of people start cheering loudly and one person counts to three. The large group of drunks start singing the lyrics to Happy Birthday with every ounce of energy they have left. I cover my ears as the men in front of Lance and I practically scream the lyrics with their arms around each other. Lance and I look at each other and smile. The room is stuffy and hot. My ears seem to block up and all I can hear for a while is my heart beating. It feels like I’m falling asleep on the spot. Pale violet begins encompassing my vision and the colour starts bleeding into my image of Lance as I float around in my skull. As the violet gets darker, my skull begins to suffocate my brain. The heartbeats in my ears buzz and shoot pain through my head. I shut my eyes tightly, making the pain worse, then blink a few times. Every time I open my eyes, Lance is closer and his face looks more worried. The pains subside after four blinks or so, but I find myself feeling slightly dizzy, as if I’m swaying. Lance puts his hand on my shoulders.

“Are you okay?” he shouts over the birthday song. My ears are still pulsing. I nod at him and blink a few more times. Almost immediately, another colour starts to fill my vision. I can’t quite pick what it is until it grows so large that it fills my field of vision completely.


End file.
